Minding the fragmentation of the news industry

I’ll be fishing in another class, mashing words and data. (Math is fun!)

I’m also tending Wired Journalists, a social networking site “to help journalists who have few resources on hand other than their own desire to make a difference and help journalism grow into its new 21st century role.” It was started by Howard Owens, Ryan Sholin, and Zac Echola. I hope you’ll join us.

The obvious nonconsumer market is youth. Much is already marketed to 15-35-year-olds. It’s smarter to think younger.

But the same lessons can be applied to just individuals but larger markets — such as underdeveloped countries. So I poked around and found a model for expansion, by Alfred Sirleaf, in Monrovia, Liberia. Lydia Polgreen of The New York Times wrote about him, so I wrote to her to see if she knows how I might be able to contact him.